History Repeats
by Stretch1
Summary: Seven NMLers find themselves, like in so many fics, back in time. However, this isn't Newsies, and it sure as heck ain't a musical. 1899 seems to slap them in the face with reality as they have to accomplish several goals, all while losing their identitie
1. Prologue

"Ahhhhh!" came the voice of a rather excited and, perhaps, rather insane teenage girl. The tourists passing through shook their heads, eying her with suspicions of lunacy before remembering this was New York City and moving on. After all, there was a man who frequented the streets dressed like Superman and who could forget Abortion Woman? What was so strange about a sixteen year old shouting off the Brooklyn Bridge?

However, those closest to said teenage girl rolled their eyes, and one in particular grabbed her and pulled her from the edge. "Thanks for that little trip to 1899, Boots, but now we interrupt your broadcast day with reality. People are staring," Lindsay pointed out, Sarah laughing despite it as the group they were with tried to avoid the girl and the looks she was getting.

As Sarah burst into laughter, Cassie was unable to keep from joining in. So much for acting her age…Who wanted to act twenty-four anyway? Certainly no Newsies fan. And Newsies fans they were, three of a group of seven who had chanced upon each other in a rally of sorts to the city that started it all.

"If we're done yelling down bridges, we have, like, forty places to cover in the next day and I don't want to be stuck in Tribeca after midnight when we're staying in Midtown," Carrie interrupted, talking quietly to Nikita and Rachel as Brittney took turns playing the tour guide and playing a Liza Minnelli impersonator…or just insulting whoever she fancied.

It was an odd group, to be sure, but, such came from the Newsies world, along with a unified obsession for the time period. "Relax, we've got the museum thing to go to and-" Nikita started, before suddenly being interrupted, hitting into a suddenly stagnant Brittney. "Uh…I'm walking here?"

"Thank you, De Niro…Was that De Niro? Oh well, it's De Niro to me," Carrie replied, before looking in the direction Brittney was. "What the hell? Britt…Remember? One foot in front of the other."

"Shut up, Stretch," was all she replied with, which certainly spelled distracted, grabbing the nearest person and dragging them toward a shop, leaving the others no choice but to follow. "This wasn't here last time and…It looks so…"

"Are You Afraid of the Dark?" Carrie replied, looking at the tiny magic shop, wondering what in the hell was so special about the place. It looked more…Oh, shiny. Never mind, this worked as a break between Newsies landmarks.

"Not since I was twelve," Lindsay retorted, a bit sardonically as if it were a question as opposed to a television reference, looking around with the rest. She passed through shelves containing various liquids and thought it better to avoid reading the ingredients, and wasn't the only one intrigued, if not a little creeped out, by the store's merchandise. Rachel stared at something, trying to figure out what the heck it was before realizing it, quite possibly, wasn't anything at all, and yet couldn't take her eyes off of it.

As each girl glanced down the cramped aisles and on the dusty shelves, Sarah whispered something about it looking like something out of a bad music video when suddenly a woman appeared behind her, nearly causing her to have a stroke then and there.

Something I can help you find?" the woman asked, seemingly not even noticing Sarah's shock and the discomfort that followed.

"Yeah, my stomach…You kind of made it jump out of my throat just now," she replied, shaking it off, Rachel finally tearing her eyes off of the…thing…but only to finally get the question answered as to what it was. Then she could move on. Then it wouldn't plague her. What in the hell…She had to ask.

"Umm…Ma'am…What-" she was cut off, the woman swooping over to her and replying, almost massaging the darn thing as she lifted it up from the shelf.

"This gives you whatever you want…Anything you want."

"Uh, great…but what is it?" she continued, obviously not pleased with a simple answer of what it was, and a hokey one at that. Anything you want? Right. And so did a wishbone.

The woman stared at her for a moment, at a loss of what to say to such disregard for the object's abilities. Her shoulder slumped a bit before she once again tried to be enigmatic, waving it around a bit in front of Rachel's face, the other girls stifling laughter or hide looks of surprise. What the hell had this woman been drinking?

"No one knows. It's centuries old and-"

"You know, I had a pet rock that looked like that once," Nikita interrupted, obviously not amused. "It was centuries old too…Funny, it never gave me any wishes. Probably why I had it impounded and put to sleep."

Smirking in return, the woman handed it to Sarah, who seemed the most eager of the seven to listen to the story. "Whatever you wish…" she repeated, the brunette looking at the small, morphed stony thing in her palm.

As Sarah looked it over, Brittney arched her eyebrow, whispering in Carrie's ear, "I'm half expecting her to say her name is Sardo."

"No, Missus," Carrie replied with a smile.

"Accent on the 'do'," the Minnelli wannabe finished, before biting her tongue as Sarah too seemed to become disinterested with the woman and her constant talks of wonder and…stuff.

"You know, I might as well wish for us to live the movie with as much as even I believe her at this point," Sarah said to Lindsay as the woman left them to think it over, glancing every now and then at the group of girls. She'd convince them…

Cassie laughed at the thought, taking her newsie cap out of her bag and sending the other girls a wink. "Well, she said whatever you want will come true. We might as well be prepared."

"You look like a dork," Carrie jabbed good-humoredly, grabbing the girl's cap off her head and rushing out the door, the others not far behind. They had other sites to see that were more time-period and Newsies appropriate. And, as the woman in the store started to laugh, it was apparent they had no idea how time-period and Newsies appropriate things would get.


	2. Some Sick Joke

Light flooded through the windows, sneaking up on Rachel and peeling her eyes open. Damn sun…As much as she tried to roll over and go back to sleep, she found it to be, well, nothing short of impossible. No such luck. Sun, you won this battle, Rachel throwing the blankets off of herself and shuffling over to the window to see if there was some way to…Blinds? Where did the…And where…Oh you have got to be kidding!

She had to be dreaming, she just had to be! Yet, as each girl slowly awoke, the reality of the situation soon dawned on her. They were…Well, she had no idea where they were, but it sure wasn't the hotel they had gone to sleep in the night before.

The room's clean, painted walls had seemingly melted away with only bare, rotting wood surrounding them, their beds looking closer to army cots than the thick mattresses they had rested on just hours before. Her mind had to be playing tricks on her, but, then why was everyone else waking up with the same sick realization? Each girl tried to find some way of waking herself up, of arising from this nightmare, waking up back in their three-star Midtown hotel to laugh about it later. No such luck.

"What the hell?" came Nikita, knowing she damn well didn't share a room with all of them the night before, let alone a room in a state like this. Were they drugged and dragged to some dingy hostel like in a gore flick? That seemed the liklier story until the very distinctive sound of hoof prints could be heard in the cobblestone streets below.

As more sounds flooded through the room, there was a mad dash to the window, several of the girls swearing up a storm at what they saw, the others looking as if they were either bordering on a panic attack or passing out. In Brittney's case, both. "This can't be happening. Umm...alright...retrace my steps..." Cassie muttered in a panic.

"Retrace your steps? Cassie! You can't just trace them back from a Holiday Inn to an attic, or whatever the hell we're in, over a hundred years ago!" Carrie snapped, Lindsay apparently trying to close her eyes and open them up several times to, perhaps, actually wake up, Sarah eventually getting tired of it and just hitting her upside the head.

"Someone's screwing with us..." was Brittney's scientific response, despite her eyes being glued to a street vendor in obvious Victorian clothing with obvious Victorian surroundings. "Someone has to be screwing with us...Someone has to...to find me my xanax!" she finished, bordering on a royal, high class, Joan Crawford freak out.

"Who the hell could be screwing with us, and why would they pick the seven of us, sneak us all out somehow, and put us in an area of town that they're doing a...You know, I can't even finish that. I'm going to...lie back down," Nikita stated, trying to work this whole thing out in her head as others attempted to do the same, either to themselves or out loud.

As Lindsay paced across the room, damn near driving the others insane, or those not doing the same, she felt something hit the side of her leg in her pants pocket. Stopping abruptly, her hand graced her pocket, her eyes widening in realization. "No way...I set this thing down!" she announced, taking the strange stone object into her hand and inspecting it, as if doubting it was the one she had looked at less than a day before. With its distinguishing marks, she found herself unable to deny it, and she soon found the others crowding around her in confusion to inspect it.

"You took it?!" Sarah accused, taking it from her, eying it as if, should she blink, it would change shape or at least give them some answers.

"I didn't steal it! I put it back when that woman started squawking about her 'Whatever you want' crap and I said...Oh shit..." she finished, the color draining from her face. "There's no way..."

"When you said what?" Rachel asked, her fingers pressing against her temples to try and quell the headache that was coming.

It took a good few moments for Lindsay to find her voice again, let alone find a way to explain, but, with the others urging her on by the looks they sent her, she figured it was now or...death. "When I said I might as well wish to be in the movie with as much as I believed her. There's no way this could be it, though! I mean, she didn't know what movie we were talking about, and this sure doesn't look like a musical! It's not my fault!" she finished, almost in desperation.

All seven females were now buzzing, talking over each other, until finally Carrie practically screamed, seeing as she lacked the ability to whistle, stomping her foot for emphasis as if she were having a temper tantrum. Hey, it worked. "We're not getting anywhere like this...We...Alright, umm, we need to get out of here and figure out what's going on. Lindsay's right...let's just figure out what happened, where we are, and how the hell to get back to the hotel and, for Christ's sake, back in bed."

"Since when are you the voice of reason?" Brittney asked after a while, realizing her medication was nowhere to be found.

"Since you're not," she retorted, Rachel clearing her throat, herheadache worsening but her senses coming back in full force.

"We can't figure anything out looking like this when people out there are...well, looking like that. It would be one thing if we were, you know...I don't even know, but it would be another if we were wherever, looking like something out of Back to the Future."

"Can I be called Clint Eastwood?" Cassie suddenly asked, before looking sheepish. "Sorry...I'll...go look for something."

As she reached for the door, she was damn near thrown backward as it opened, practically in her face, all seven girls shooting up to see who it was and if they could get any answers. And then, if possible, they became even more shocked and confused than before.

"Oh you have got to be kidding me," Nikita said, going from shocked to downright irritated. "Either you're that woman from that store and we were the millionth customers, or this is a damn joke and it's not funny anymore..."

Funny or not, the woman seemed to be smiling, and while it didn't seem evil with the fires of hell behind it, it did seem unnerving. "No. No joke. No millionth anything. You made a wish...of sorts. Only...no dancing, no singing, no...what is that charming boy's name?"

"Christian Bale?" Sarah asked, arching her eyebrow at the shopkeeper as if she had grown another head.

"That's the one. Christian Bale...No him. See, people tend to take things for granted. I know who you are, all of you, and I know how most of you see a movie such as the one you worship. I know how there's more arguments over who loves that...Christian...the most more than there are arguments over the sides of the strike, over what people fought for. Time passes after something important, people take the event itself for granted, and soon people are arguing over petty issues instead of taking things for what they were. It see it mostly revolve around films based on real events. Loosely based, I should say. You don't even want to know what happened with the Pearl Harbor group."

"So...let me get this straight..." Lindsay started. "You, who we still have no idea who the heck you are, are making an example of us because people like us get joy from a movie based around an event instead of the event?"

"To some extent. Not just that, but...well, I like having people walk around in others' shoes...get a feel for how someone else lives and how someone else has to get by. You all...well, you'll see what I mean in time. Nothing will harm you while you're here, or at least nothing serious, and there are a few things you have to do before you get back home, but you will get back home. Just think of this as an experience, or an experiment. Before you know it, you'll be back in your respective hotel rooms and no one will know you had left. But, there are some things that you all need to learn, if not for your own sakes then for the sakes of those whom you speak with, whom you argue with about the color of Spot's eyes or which small part had which lines. There are more crucial things to focus on, and your generation misses them. I'll be here every step of the way, and...well, you all might want to change into some clothes in the hall closet. You'll get noticed looking like that and, if you want to try and figure things out, it's hard to do that with everyone staring at you."

The girls had all taken to sitting down, taking the whole thing in, her words slowly processing in their minds. It was all too much to take, and, yet, here they were, being force-fed her righteous notions, being made an example of because teenage girls didn't understand historical significance or some such tripe she was peddling.

"Who are you?" Brittney finally asked, trying to keep her nerves calm, more in a dazed state now than anything.

"For now? you can call me Mr. Q," the woman laughed, disappearing out the door before anyone could respond. The whole thing seemed unreal, and yet there they were, still sitting on these mattresses, still surrounded by rotting wooden walls, still hearing the hoof prints on cobblestone outside their window. While it might have been too much to take, one way or another they had to take it. This was reality...for now, anyway. Some sort of Twilight Zone reality.

"Well, what do we do now?" Cassie asked, sitting on the edge of the cot she had awoken into this nightmare from, her chin resting on her knee.

"We don't really have a choice, do we?" Rachel asked, and, as their eyes scanned over each other, each girl began to realize the truth of that statement.


	3. It's a Fine Life

As the rough fabric was pulled over them, the girls realized they, indeed, did not have a choice. They didn't have a choice but to get out of their modern clothes and change into something a bit more period appropriate. They didn't have a choice but to pull on the worn brown boots that made bare feet look like a lesser evil. However, the more they realized of how little a choice they had, the more they wondered if they had a say in anything anymore.

"Why can't we wear pants?" Sarah mumbled, somewhat to herself as she inspected her reflection in the cracked washroom mirror. "I mean...Weren't there women who wore pants?"

"You're thinking of either Yentil or Mary Sue..." Carrie pointed out, making a face at the grey fabric and how it fit. "I feel like I'm in a curtain."

"I feel like I'm in a concentration camp," Brittney replied, looking about half a step from hitting her head into the wall. She was still fully convinced this was a bad joke, and any minute someone would pop out and say they were on Candid Camera or whatever the devil it is kids watched these days.

All seven shared her feelings, noting to the reality show feel of it, mainly because of how much of a nightmare it was. As the minutes passed, though, the girls slowly began to actually wish for a camera to show up, and their doubts that it would happen seemed to grow until it outweighed anything else. They were here...really here.

They each inspected themselves, each made disgusted faces at their own respected reflections, and each longed for a pair of jeans instead of a long skirt. Well, you apparently can't always get what you want. Then again, you shouldn't be able to travel over a hundred years into the past because of a damn movie, either.

"So, when exactly are we going to brave the outside?" Cassie spoke up, messing with her tight collar for what she felt was the thousandth time, the ripped lace terribly uncomfortable. In fact, the whole damn outfit was.

"Well, we can't just stand around doing absolutely nothing. If we're going to get the heck out of here and into something that actually fits, we might as well go ahead and just get it over with," came Rachel's voice of reason, overshadowing Rachel's feeling of desperation.

Taking deep breaths, they looked at each other and silently wished each other luck, though they weren't entirely sure for what. After all, they didn't know what was on the outside of the building other than, by the sounds of it, vendors and horse drawn carriages. Secretly they each wished for the others to go ahead of them and let them wallow alone in the barren room, none of them too willing to tackle what lay beyond those doors, but they also knew such thoughts were in vain. So, as they prepared themselves, it took a group effort to push the doors open to face the reality of what lay outside. So much for Candid Camera.

The girls scanned the city streets, for the first time so shocked they completely forgot their own desperate situation, each one at a loss of what to say. The small, dilapidated building they had just set out of seemed to mirror it's surroundings, and even the people seemed worn and rotting like the building's walls.

"Where the hell are we?" came Nikita, having finally found her voice once a vendor in the distance shocked her back to earth with his yells.

"If we weren't so...you know, a hundred years ago, I might be able to tell you," Brittney replied, looking for familiar landmarks or, really, anything to indicate their location. "We're definitely not in Midtown...So, so much for waking up in the same place you went to sleep, right time or not."

Her eyes searched the skyline as they slowly walked forward, until she finally gasped in realization, but not before tripping over a newsie in the process. "Whoa!" she exclaimed, very nearly losing her footing entirely, looking down to see the tiny offender.

"'Ey! Watch where ya's goin'!" the mini child snapped, sending her an obscene gesture and heading off, the girls too shocked to say or do much of anything.

"I'm pretty sure a six year old shouldn't be doing that..." Cassie suddenly said once the boy was out of sight.

"I'm pretty sure he shouldn't be working, either, but I guess so much for that," Carrie replied, shaking her head before jabbing Brittney, sending her a look to remind her they needed to know where they were, and she was the only person with any idea at all.

"OH!" the New York native exclaimed once more. "We're somewhere near the Brooklyn Bridge...I think...well, hell, there's a damn street sign, so you all can stop looking at me like that!" she finished, her common sense kicking in as she rushed toward the post, the others not too far behind. "Broome. Oh! Yeah...I know where we are. Broome and Orchard...Wait. Oh, friggin clever. She brought us to where the tenement museum was. You know? The one we went to after we saw her. This is it."

Looking up, they noted that it was, indeed, the same building, though it looked remarkably different despite being so obviously the same. "So...we're in a Jewish area of town," Carrie suddenly pointed out, her eyes still focused on the tenement before them.

"Which means we need to get the hell out of here because we're all pretty obviously not Jewish," Brittney replied, hastening her step away from the now foreign neighborhood.

Sarah's face went from one of awe to one of confusion, however, stopping in her tracks after a while to send the group a look. "Why do we have to get out of here? I mean, we're not doing anything wrong, and no one seems to be bothering us."

"Because," started Nikita before anyone else could answer, a sign she was still herself no matter what century she was in. "If you think the US is racist and nationalistic now...Even if they don't have a problem with obvious outsiders, someone will, and it's best to not get into some sort of tift with a prejudice asshole just because, you know, we happened to be sucked into a different friggin time period altogether...Damn it, I'm never complaining about jet lag again. Time zones don't seem so bad anymore."

Before they could move forward, though, Rachel spoke up, breaking her apparent personal moment of silence in order to have some light shed on the situation. "I know we need to get out of this neighborhood, but, exactly where are we going once we go somewhere that might seem more our type...and, well, not to sound either too obvious or too off, but, none of us may be Jewish, but none of us are the same thing, either. Some of us can fit for Irish, but not all of us, and, sorry to say it, Nikita, but you're kind of out of luck there," she finished, Nikita holding up a hand in understanding. After all, being mixed-raced was strange enough in modern times. It was damn near alien in 1899. "We need to figure out a game plan, or something, before we just wander through the city streets looking for places we don't have business being in."

Suddenly a tug came on her sleeve, Rachel turning around and finding herself face to face with a rather blond, but rather peaceful looking girl staring her straight in the eyes. "You all look like you need some help...and for a nickel I'll be all the help you need. Sellin's been slow today...or every day, and you all look like you got it worse than I do. So, lay it on me, what can I do for you?"

"Well, we didn't really ask-" Nikita started, before realizing she couldn't fall back on old habits, changing her tune a bit. "I mean, we're kind of lost."

"She means we're really, truly, extremely, hopelessly lost," Lindsay interjected, figuring she might as well be honest with the girl, or as honest as she could be without explaining the details of the situation.

"Well, don't fret. Ny name's Anna, most folks call me Locket, and as soon as you toss me a nickel I'll get you unlost as fast as possible," she stated amicably, smiling widely when each girl searched her pockets, Cassie sighing in relief when she found the desperately needed coin. "I didn't half expect for that to work. Well, alright, so are you all new in town?" she asked after inspecting the nickel. Each one looked at the others before they all nodded in unison. Hey, it was the best excuse they could think of, and it didn't require an ounce of explanation. "Well, if you're looking for a job, there's plenty of factory work, especially if you speak English. The way they shout orders at you, sometimes you have to know three languages at once. Me? I prefer being my own boss...sorta. I'm a newsgirl. Not too many of us...In fact, there's closer to none than just a little, but, hey, you all could expand the market a little, you know? Just...since I helped, you can't take my spot. Selling's tight right now, but, we're hoping it'll pick up again soon."

Something was nagging at Carrie, though, and, rude or not, it had to be asked. "You don't...sound like a newsie," she said, noting her lack of slang, even if she did have a thick, New York, street accent.

"'Cause my brother taught me how to talk. Now I just need to get him to finish teaching me how to read and I'll be a regular high class lady, huh? Anyway, you all want to look at the factories, check out some of the ones uptown in the garment district. There's almost always openings...though, mostly because there's almost always someone getting hurt. You want to try your hands at being newsies? Come with me..."


	4. Outsiders

"No, you're doing it wrong..." Locket informed the group who, as it seems, were less educated than they thought in the ways of selling newspapers. While "improving the truth" was alright, there was a definite art to it, and it required precision and a talent for acting. After all, improve too much and no one believes you, don't improve enough and no one cares, and improve too often and you lose customers because no one believes a word you say. "If you can't read, you gotta learn to try and recognize important words. "Not like there's a right way to do this," she muttered a bit to herself, the headline almost entirely useless.

"Few Metropolitan Men Go On Strike, Traffic Suffers Little...This is the best we have?" Shoe read allowed, sending the others a look.

"Well, they didn't strike because the headlines were great," Nikita whispered back, reading over the paper as quickly as she could, before suddenly catching sight of an interesting looking kid giving her an interesting stare, to which she was highly inclined to send him an interesting gesture.

One by one, each girl noticed the boy, his arms crossed, sending them a condescending look. Who the hell did this kid think he was? Well, as if on cue, Locket finally looked up from the useless paper, before rolling her eyes. "Vice? What are you looking at? Ya mind?"

"No, not at all," he said, still sizing up the girls. "But I like how you're teaching them how to sell something that no one will buy from them. Since when has a girl been able to sell papers well, let alone a woman been able to sell at all? Show them to a factory and stop wasting their time."

"Girls can sell papers," Sarah defended herself, crossing her arms stubbornly and looking at him like "Oh, I so just did..."

Vice's lips curled into a sneer, his eyes turning to the painfully obvious new girl. "Sure they can. They don't do as well and never have, but, I'm sure you'll change that, won't you? Oh, and you being way too damn old to be peddling any more than your body would definitely not matter, because, well, you're just that good, I'm sure. Aren't you? Look, sweet face, try the factories or try getting a cleaning job...Selling is bad enough without some two-bit, know-nothings getting in the middle of it."

They all stood there, offended, seething, and yet unable to dispute the truth of his statements. They were outsiders and, more to the point, they were jobless without any skills trying to do something they had no business doing. "Where all did you get the money for those papers, anyway?" he asked, looking genuinely curious, if not completely inappropriate.

Cassie opened her mouth to say they didn't, that Locket had allowed them a part of the profit off her own papers instead, which weren't fairing any better than if Jack Kelly had sold them himself. Locket, however, shook her head, thinking telling Vice about their complete lack of funds was up there with last things to do. "They had some left over from their newspaper jobs back from where they came from...In...Jersey," she lied for them, even Vice arching an eyebrow at how quick that was.

"Jersey? Well, that explains it. I'll be seeing you around, newsgirls," he said, finishing with a bit of a demeaning laugh, off to sell his own stack before doing God knows what.

While several of the girls looked ready to pounce on the man and rip his eyes out, Lindsay had a bit of a problem. "Why...can't we do this? Be newsies?" she asked Locket, the newsgirl looking sheepish before sending them a sympathetic glance.

"Most...or all...of you are too old. You can start working almost anywhere at any age, but, certain jobs you get too old for, and fast. Newsie is one of them. After a while, they ain't buying your papers...they're buying something else. But...you know, that's not to say you can't do it, right? You girls look too good to be factory workers. Actually, you look too good to be on the streets. What's got you on this end of the tracks, anyway?" she finally asked, noting their clean hair, their fair complexions, and their remaining teeth.

"Uhh...our town went bankrupt. We all lost everything...had to find jobs elsewhere. So, here we are," Carrie input quickly, the others nodding in agreement.

Thank goodness for them, Locket bought the story, possibly due to it's simplicity and their lack of unnecessary elaboration, which tended to come out when you were faking it. No, best to keep things short and sweet now, and as the girl shrugged and continued to show them how to sell despite Vice's comments, they began to understand why girls of their ages weren't meant for a job such as this. Sure, they would get the occasional customer, but they weren't tipping in thanks for the printed word. It was far more disturbing than that, and with their feet blistered and their faces sun burnt by day's end, the girls all felt the strongest urge to shower it all away.

With very little money in their pockets, but money nonetheless, they waved a very grateful goodbye to Locket and dragged themselves back to the building they had found themselves in. Sure, the neighborhood wasn't the best for them, but, they were slowly seeing that no neighborhood would be, and it was the only place they were somewhat familiar with.

"Well, look at you all," came the familiar voice of the shopkeeper, or 'Mr. Q' as she had introduced herself as. "You all look a little tired. How about taking a load off, huh?"

"A little tired? A little? The only thing keeping me from murder right now is utter fucking exhaustion," voiced Brittney in a harsh tone, sending the woman a homicidal look before taking a seat on the dilapidated couch.

"Look..." she started, actually looking understanding of their situation. Compassionate, even. "It's not going to be easy, but you all need to commit to this, and you all need to get done what you're meant to get done, or who knows how long you'll be here. Trust me, it'll never be more than you can take, and, believe it or not, I'm here to help you, but you will be pushed to the limit. There is a plus, though...well, after a while, it won't really be you, so, you won't really feel much of anything."

All seven of them seemed to stop at that last statement, looking at her like she had grown a second head, and several couldn't help but think she just had to be from Brooklyn. "What do you mean, exactly, by it wont really be us?" Rachel asked, looking a great deal less pacifistic than she normally would.

"Nothing...you'll just adapt, is all. Why don't you all just...get some sleep, huh? You'll feel better. Think of this as your own personal lodging house, huh? It was once a brothel, so, a girl's lodging house isn't too much of a stretch. I'll be here when you wake up," she finished, making her way to the door, stopping in front of Rachel for a brief moment. "Was your hair always that red?"

"Huh?" was all the girl could say, looking at a stray strand, not really seeing too much of a difference. "I dunno...I guess. Probably the lighting. Why?"

"Just...didn't recall," Mr. Q finished with a shrug, heading out entirely, leaving the girls to fend for themselves for the one bathtub with it's lack of a shower head and its affinity for cold water.


	5. The Nightmare Worsens

Something felt off...When someone wakes up and feels, well, different? The large, rotting bunkroom (of sorts) seemed to have a knack for that, as everyone within it rose with that feeling. Then again, waking in 1899 New York was perhaps at fault. Barely awake, Nikita shuffled over to the busted washroom, stretched, and very nearly screamed at the mirror. Was that a mirror? That couldn't be a mirror...something was wrong. Oh, something was fucking wrong!

Rushing back out to the bunkroom, Nikita yelled out, for lack of a better thing to say, "I'm white!"

"Well, you were only half black, anyway," Carrie uttered in a tired voice, rolling over to go back to sleep.

"But I was still half fucking black!" she raged back, going back to the mirror on the off chance she was seeing things. How the hell could this happen? And she thought yesterday was like waking up in a bad horror movie! Well, if so, this was like it's even friggin worse sequel!

As Nikita continued to try and process what she was seeing in the mirror, the other girls began to slowly rise and, upon seeing several differences in themselves, too, they all rushed out to the only mirror in the building, very nearly killing each other in the process.

They had all changed, and all in different ways, and all had various degrees of panic set in. This couldn't be! It just couldn't. How could they all go to sleep one way, and wake up looking like someone else entirely? How could...Mr. Q! Oh, that bitch! As the realization of yet another shock hit them, they looked for revenge, they looked for answers...they looked for Mr. Q.

As if on cue (pun slightly intended), the shopkeeper strolled in, holding up a hand before anyone could say or do anything- such as throwing something at her head. "I know, I know. Not a way you want to start your mornings, but did you really think it was going to be a good idea for you to walk around looking like you do? With all your teeth and your healthy looks? I didn't want you to have everything put on you at once, but-" she started, Carrie cutting her off.

"But my boobs are missing! I went to bed, and they were very clearly there, and now they're gone!" she yelled, looking down right irrational. After all, in this situation, who wouldn't be? Rationality was not an option in this case.

"Does Stretch have a chest? Or a figure of any sort?" Mr. Q asked calmly, Carrie sending her a look of confusion.

"What? of course I do! I just said I did!"

Shaking her head, the woman elaborated, "No, not you Stretch. Csilla, Stretch. You know, Csilla, your character? The embodiment of what Stretch is in the past? She had no figure, she was blond, she was, well, what you are now. You are all what you've invisioned your original characters to be. Your lives are now their lives, and that's the other part of this little...lesson. You are to understand what they go through, what they've gone through. Writing a horrible event is one thing, but living it is quite another. After a while, you'll stop answering to your modern names and answer to your character names, so get used to calling each other by your nicknames as those never change. Get used to this idea, because your memories will fade and soon you'll have theirs. I'll still be here to help you, but you'll only see me now as a lodging house worker instead of what you know me as now."

"Well, that explains the...plain look," came Brittney, looking down at her average, figure-less body, her glasses still there but the style having changed, her tattoos missing, anything worth noticing gone. She was now what Audrey was, what Snooza was...Plain. They were each as they had written themselves, in a manner of speaking, and as the thought dawned on them, several took it worse than others.

"There's no way in hell I'm living Relic's life!" came Nikita. "Not as out of her fucking mind as she is!"

"As out of her mind as you made her? True, she wrote herself, but, to some degree, you made her this way. You made her past before she wrote her present herself. You created her, you have to understand her. You all have to understand what you've created and what it really means to have lived these lives. It's one thing to write a character being starved, beaten, raped, anything. It's another to live it. Like I said, I'm here to make sure you don't get more than you can handle, but, you will be pushed to the limit. Write down what you can while you're still literate. You have today with your memories of who you are. Tomorrow the strike starts, and tomorrow you're entirely your characters and have no recollection of who you are...or were."


	6. DoubleEdged Sword

"So...by no recollection," Brittney started, the entire conversation taking a few moments to even process, let alone for her to truly react. The last two days had put her poor gears into overdrive and she was officially mental exhausted, something the other six could relate to entirely.

"I mean, you won't even know your own names anymore. Today you're going to start forgetting things about your own lives, and start to feel that your writings about theirs are now your memories. You will not longer see these things as third person, but as things you, yourself, have experienced. You're not Brittney, you're Audrey...You already look the part, and soon you'll be playing the part. Think of this as a dress rehearsal before the show tomorrow," Mr. Q replied, looking extraordinarily relaxed considering all she had unloaded on the girls in the past five minutes, let alone the past two days.

"What if I don't want to be Relic? What if I didn't fucking sign up to be Samantha friggin Kates and I want to get my ass back home and in my bed now?" Nikita asked, looking like she was about to damn near throttle the woman. Screw polite conversation. As far as she was concerned, turning her into someone she didn't want to be without her concent was reason enough to rid herself of any polite behavior she may have had.

Mr. Q sat there, smiling, waiting for the girl to finish. After all, she knew them all, whether they knew her or not. She knew better than to interrupt. However, when it finally seemed safe, she replied, "I know you didn't sign up for this, but, think of it this way...You were all drafted, and while I could have let you go on your merry way like I have several other potentials, you all, with all your stories and your various characters and lives, seemed to be able to represent the time period well enough and be able to understand your characters best. After all, Nikita, you understand the ins and outs of what it means to be Samantha 'Relic' Kates, don't you?"

"Hell no I don't!" she snapped back. "Half the time I don't even know what she's talking about, and she was more normal in 1902 than she was in 1899! I don't even want to touch on 1899! So now I'm a fourteen year old basketcase and you're telling me...Oh fuck you!" And, with that, the girl headed toward her designated cot and looked damned determined to get back to sleep.

"I dunno...This...might not be so bad," Sarah replied after a while, trying to look on the bright side. "I mean, it will be kinda neat, right? It'll be...educational?"

"I don't need educational. I was fine with my degree," Rachel replied, not quite as angry as Nikita, but bordering on irate. However, she did have to consider the amount of research she'd get here and now that she wouldn't elsewhere. What better way to research the strike and the events surrounding it than to be involved?

It began to sink in in different ways for each of the girls, some looking more at the positive, some livid about the negatives, and some just wanting to forget the whole thing entirely. This was way too much to handle, especially for a vacation. They signed up to see Ellis Island, not to look like they just came through it!

"You just need to get through a few things and then it's life as usual. Nothing seriously traumatizing will happen to you," Mr. Q assured them, the lump that was Nikita laughing under her blankets, which the shopkeeper merely ignored. "Like I said, you'll slowly lose your memories...It'll be less sudden than any previous changes, so write down what you can while you still can. Some of you won't be literate when all of this finishes, so, might as well get it out while you can both write and remember. Oh, before I forget as well, those people you met yesterday? They'll now slowly start to know you as well. As far as they're concerned, meeting the modern you, the real you, never happened. It's two-sided, though. You'll know them and they'll know you...The character of you, anyway." With that, she headed out, leaving them with yet another headache to try and comprehend, everyone still sitting in denial over the whole situation.

Finally, Brittney decided to actually be the voice of reason, perhaps because she had gone so far beyond what her nerves would allow that all there was left was a strange calm...like the calm after a storm. "Everyone, find a piece of paper or something and something to write with. I have a few things I'd prefer to, you know, not forget entirely. Don't bother with stuff like your family and whatever...Just, well, if people are going to know us and if things are going to happen that we know now because we wrote about them and we won't know later, we might as well try and get those out of the way first before anything extra."

So, the great hunt for pens and paper began, an old ledger and a bottle of half-dried ink being all they could come up with. So, finding hair pins and things of the sort, resorting to fingernails if they had to, the girls wrote down all they needed to remember- little notes of general dates and names of people to contact or avoid. The more they wrote, the more they felt attached to the names they were writing about, the more memories they had never even written suddenly coming to mind. When had Cassie ever tricked someone into diving into the Hudson in the middle of winter? When had Brittney ever stolen jewelry from a corner store because she had the sudden urge?

However, as Mr. Q had said, it was all two-sided, and the more useless memories they attained from their OCs, the less they remembered from their own lives. Lindsay couldn't remember small things like holidays or her first bike, Sarah couldn't remember her boyfriend...was he a boyfriend or just a friend that was a boy? Rachel was beginning to lose track of all of her family members, which wasn't too hard to do considering the sheer size, but, to her it still raised an alarm. Mr. Q wasn't kidding...they had to get everything in order now, while they could.

"So..." Carrie started, looking around the group before her. "Any ideas of where to go or what to do first?"

"We need real jobs," Nikita pointed out, having crawled back into her bed once she realized what all being Relic entailed. There were too many people in Samantha Kates's life that she didn't want to even think about, let alone contact, and the list of people to avoid was far longer than anything else she could think to write down. "Just...keep me away from Harlem. In fact, keep me away from outside entirely. Everything Relic touches turns to shit and she's a basketcase to boot. I'm not going out there."

"You kinda have to," Brittney pointed out. "Bosley said we have a mission or some such and we need to all do it...wait, she said several...whatever. But, we all need to do them and you'll forget you don't want to go outside in a few hours anyway, so why not get it over with and get something done."

"Fuck..." was all Nikita replied with at first, before kicking the sheets off of herself in an irritated manner. "I know that in a few hours, I'll be forgetting a lot, but that's because Relic is a drunkard and...Shit, no she wasn't. Not really. Fuck. Ben...Fuck, I'm going back to bed."

Several of the girls looked at each other confused, Sarah turning to ask in a whisper. "Who's Ben?"

"Let's just say he's the ex from Hell. Come on. If Ben is around, that means several others are too, which means we need to find them while we know who they are and how to talk to them. I can't remember how close to some of them I am, but, I know I'm at least on their good sides," Carrie replied.

"Like who?" Cassie asked, trying to think of anyone she may know, her OC lacking really any attachments, or any permanent ones, anyway.

At that, suddenly Nikita shot up, looking straight at Carrie, simply saying one word. "Dusk?"

"Dusk."


	7. For Crying Out Loud

"Dusk?" came Sarah, highly confused how an exchange of one word could, somehow, seemingly, solve a problem. The last thing they needed was some false hope because of some strange word.

"Albequerque. See? I can do it too...Snorkle," came the ever enlightening voice of Brittney, her form different but her tone still the same. "Not mine, but still funny. Anyway, dusk is that time that comes after the sunset. You know? Like evening. In the way they're speaking about it, though, they mean a character. If characters are here, that means the psycho Jew is, and where he is...OH! My man!"

Everyone noticed the sudden difference in tone from the formerly sarcastic girl. How could they not? She just now practically squeaked. "Your man?" Cassie asked, the entire room now looking at her, crickets practically chirping.

"Yeah...ummm...ask her," she gestured toward Carrie, now eager to avoid the attention, which seemed rather odd for a Liza wannabe.

Sighing, the now-blond, former-dyed-redhead-natural-blond, decided it best to explain who the hell Dusk was, who Brittney's, aka Snooza's, man was, and what the hell they had to prepare for. After all, someone couldn't just stroll up to the gang leader Jew with a 'tude. "Dusk is a character of mine that is involved in all of our profiles. If what Mr. Q said was right, then Dusk should be here, along with all of his Hell's Kitchen group. Granted, it is before either Snooza or Relic met him, but Stretch knew him, at least somewhat. I wasn't...She wasn't...one of them, but I...SHE...was at least, to some degree, a friend. So, if we have a problem, Dusk can help us. I can say all of you are from outside of Manhattan...well, I know Rae is from Tribeca and Brooklyn, Snooza...Aren't you from Brooklyn? Anyway, Relic is from Harlem, so she only, mainly, knows upper Manhattan, and I don't know about the rest of you, but he can at least give us a tour. Sooner or later, our...their...memories will kick in and we'll figure out where we are and all that. Besides, if we do have to take part in the strike, there's no one better to be on our side than Dusk."

"You know..." Rachel started, seeming deep in thought. "What if a newsie from the movie was in our profiles? You know? I had Spot...What happens then?" It was a perfectly good question, and one that none of them had an answer to.

"I guess we have to find out..." Nikita replied, still not looking forward to stepping outside, but, something inside her was eager to see Dusk. True, in 1899 she...she Relic...had yet to meet him, but there was something about knowing what he was going to do for her...her Relic...that made both Nikita and Relic want to see him, see how he was, she what she could use against him later, and, especially, just kind of be near him. It was an odd feeling, knowing what the future held for her because she had written it, and knowing the knowledge would soon leave her entirely.

"You still didn't talk about my man," Snooza said in a huff, the definite line between Audrey and Brittney blurring, to which Carrie only sighed.

"Satire is a German kid with a big smile, glasses, and is a general dork. I don't know how else to describe him but a young Harold Lloyd...and I got the inspiration for his looks after I saw anything about Harold. So, if you know what he looks like, good for you. If not, you'll find out."

"Oooh! I know!" exclaimed Cassie, before looking sheepish as everyone's eyes turned toward her. "I just...my Dad has some Harold movies and...I walked by his star once and...never mind."

"Well, he won't be too much use fighting, but he's good to have on our side too, especially since he's friends with Dusk. And where Dusk is...you know, it's times like these I'm way too happy I've developed too many people," Carrie replied, the Stretch side of her dashing out of the worn building and navigating the streets with a great deal of ease more than the day before. Of course, she still got lost a time or two, and it took Brittney...or was it Audrey? Whichever. It took Snooza's knowledge to get them toward Midtown.

Once they hit the Hell's Kitchen neighborhood, the smell of rotting meat and the Hudson hit them like a ton of bricks, the modern them nearly gagging at the scents that surrounded them. "Welcome to Hell's fucking Kitchen," Nikita said, her eyes almost watering from the bitterness in the air.

"Just...try to find an old warehouse. Dusk will be there alone because the others actually work during the day. When he does sell papers, he sells the evening edition and then...Well, I won't get into what he does at night," Stretch said, scanning the abandoned buildings spread out on the docks until she found one that, somehow, felt familiar. "There," she stated, starting toward the broken warehouse. While a great deal larger than the building they had currently taken up refuge, it was still, by no means, something to look at.

"You sure waking him up is a good idea?" came Relic, looking up at the ominous warehouse, before shrugging it off. "Screw it. If I'm awake, he needs to be. That's my philosophy." And, without a second thought, she headed in right beside Stretch, the rest shrugging and following behind.

The warehouse looked just like Stretch, or was it Carrie, remembered or invisioned. Either way, it was familiar, and she passed through the mess scattered around the floor, heading for the stairs without much thought. Finding the bunkroom, if it could be called that, wasn't much of an issue, the old cots and abandoned mattresses littering an old storage area. It seemed more like part of a refugee camp than a lodging house of their own, but, Stretch supposed it worked for them.

A few bunks down was the all too familiar, and yet foreign, face of one Joshua "Dusk" Samson. "Guys...uhh...how about you stand back and let me handle him. He gets cranky if he's woken up," Stretch whispered tentatively, Snooza scoffing.

"Understatement of the century," she replied, but was all too willing to stand back with the others, Relic the only one willing to go against that idea.

"I can handle him," she said, somewhat eager to give him a rude awakening if she knew whether or not he had a weapon nearby.

"You Nikita or you Samantha?" Stretch asked, arching an eyebrow and wondering which side of the other female was willing to be a part of the whole 'wake up a gang hitman' process.

Sending Stretch a look that only she could make, she retorted, "Me Relic," and, with that, moved toward his bunk with a sort of determination. On one hand, he didn't scare her. Samantha "Relic" Kates wasn't scared of...Well, she was scared of some people, but this kid lying there wasn't one of them. However, on the other, Nikita knew how Dusk worked. Well, no she didn't, not at this time, and the logical, still Nikita part of her wanted to tell Samantha to shut up and leave him alone. He was psychotic. Sure, he got nice later...but that was a big, fat later. Now? Now he was unstable, and she supposed now she was too. Thank goodness there was more logic in her, at least at this moment, than irrational (or more Nikita than Sam, same thing), because she stood back a little, watching as Stretch carefully shook the sleeping boy.

"Dusk? Dusk?" she tried gently, before the Csilla inside her caused her to shove him roughly. "Dusk!" she said once more, more force behind it, more of a Russian accent than usual. It seemed to work though, Russian or not, as the black-haired, pale as all get out boy was startled back into the waking world.

"What the hell?" he started, his eyes focusing, ready to grab his brass knuckles, girl or not. No one woke him up, including...Stretch? Was that..."Stretch? What the hell are you doing here?"

"Relax...Dusk, we're friends, right? I mean, we're friends...so...When a friend is in trouble, you help them...right?" she started, sounding unsure about all this. She had never been face to face with the boy, and it was a little unnerving. She knew him inside and out, and yet she didn't. He was her character, but he was also just an acquaintance. Damn you, Mr. Q, this was way too confusing!

"Alright, what have you done?" he asked, sitting up in bed, glancing around the room and seeing the other girls, completely uninvited, having seen him asleep. This had better be good.

Biting her lip, she thought of the best way to say it, before finally opting for honesty...sort of. "Dusk...Umm...something happened or something is going to happen. I don't know. I don't know what and I don't know why, but I'm going to need your help. We are. I...met these girls around where I've been staying nowadays, and they...they've heard things. I don't know how to word it, and I'm trying to make this make as much sense as possible-"

"Which isn't working, kiddo," he told her, but sounded less angry as he listened to the desperation in her voice. He was an ass, he was a thug, and he had one hell of an ego, but he was also loyal and she was one he had some loyalty to.

"I know...Dusk...Just, we need your help. Something bad is happening..." was all she could find herself saying, every girl in the room feeling the figurative cloud hovering over them, Nikita feeling the despair of Ben and her current situation, Snooza realizing she had no one and no place to go, Gimmick, who had fallen silent in the whole mess, realizing that her entire family was now gone...Everything was gone.

"Alright..." he began, damning himself and his good intentions. "Go find the others if you can and come back here around five. I'll...sleep on whatever the hell you just gave me."


	8. Rock and a Hard Place

Despite now having an ally, the girls left the warehouse, feeling no better than before, in part due to the slow reality of the situation. They really were losing their memories, and each one glanced around, unsure if they had written instances in specific locations with specific people, or if they had, now, actually lived them. Relic felt a strange connection with the man they had just met, and felt as if she knew him inside and out, and had never met him before in her life.

"Where now?" Gimmick asked, having a strange sinking feeling that they were running out of time, and the remaining hours weren't nearly enough to do all they needed to and settle whatever they needed to settle. However, what concerned her more was she was she was losing who her mother was, who her friends were, what high school she went to. Every little happy moment of her real life was being washed away and replaced with the desperation of her character self.

"Well, we all need to think about who we all know, you know, in this little reality we have now," came Stretch, feeling ever so slightly accomplished. However, the more she thought of what had to be done, the more she felt it slipping away.

Relic seemed less than pleased with that thought, shaking her head adamantly, very nearly laughing at the idea. "You girls can do whatever you want and have fun finding whoever you want. I'm steering clear of anyone I so much as recognize until I'm too out of my damn mind to know the difference. Of course, being friggin' Samantha alchie Kates, that should only be a matter of time."

"Now, Deborah, don't be bitter," came the still Brittney side of Snooza, before her Audrey side kicked in, sighing deeply. "Everyone I know in this city is dead, useless, or I apparently haven't met them yet." While, physically, nothing was missing that wasn't missing before, and she already had glasses so what was the point about griping about that, mentally she was beginning to feel a strain. Snooza's memories were taking over and, for poor Brittney, these memories were lonely and difficult to process. Sure, she wrote them, they all wrote them, but they were all realizing in different ways they had now been through these memories, lived through these memories.

"It depends," came Shoe, sounding both pensive and slightly disturbed. "I don't know which Shoe I am." At the looks of confusion, she rolled her eyes and elaborated, "I'm either seventeen and I know no one in particular, or I'm twenty-four and I have a kid and I'm a whore."

"Well, there's a nice little difference," Echo replied awkwardly, thankful she hadn't created herself to be a sixteen year old prostitute or child bride or some such idea that made her skin crawl. Of course, she did think back to her family, or lack thereof, and muttered softly, "I don't really know much of anyone."

Gimmick put a gentle hand to her friend's shoulder, attempting to comfort the girl as she thought to herself anyone that may, in any sense of the word, be useful. In a moment, however, she soon seemed to pep up, exclaiming excitedly, "Jimmy! I know Jimmy!" before adding sheepishly, "Sorry, just…you know…happy I know someone."

"Who's Jimmy?" Rachel asked, having been mulling over the same problem Shoe seemed to be having. Which life of Rae Kelly's was she really leading? Which people did she know? Who was even around, anyway?

"Basically, a red-headed step child. Well, he's red-headed, and he's about as awkward as you can get, but he's someone I know, and he's bound to be of some use, right? I mean, he's a guy in New York. There's always some use for a good guy, weird as he might be, in New York."

"That's debatable," came Brittney, before clearing her throat. "Please, continue."

"Sooner or later, even if we don't find them, they'll find us, right?" Rae added, looking around to the other six, several shrugging indifferently, others looking downright disturbed by that idea. None quite as much as Relic, who, as time wore on, became more and more unstable by the thoughts in her head and the impending doom she felt breathing down her neck.

"But, what then?" Shoe asked, her eyes scanning the females surrounding her. "I mean, where do we go from there? What do we tell them? Where the heck to we go? We just do what we did with that Dusk guy and say 'Oh, something is going to happen' and go on to find the next person until we lose our minds? We stay with that weird woman who did this to us and keep letting her do weird little things to us. What if, next time we wake up, she says we have to stay here for good?"

All seven girls looked at each other, unable to answer this question, and simply took a seat on the side of the road to think with what little information they had left. Each one seemed so lost in her own fading thoughts that, when Rachel spoke up in a sort of relieved excitement, the remaining six practically jumped into the street in surprised. "Mrs. B!" she exclaimed, the others looking at her as if she had officially snapped under the pressure. "What? Mrs. B is this old woman that Rae…I mean, I, get a tenement with eventually. I know she's there now, but, if we need, we can just stay there…"

"You didn't think to mention this before?" Brittney asked, sounding more irritated than relieved at this point, though it was rather displaced.

Rachel looked a bit put off by the other girl's attitude, though soon shook it off, figuring other things were more important. However, she couldn't deny, for a moment, Rae's Irish temper threatened to burst out and either snap at Snooza or just flat out hit her and be done with it. "I just remembered her…you have anything you want to add to it?" Alright, so maybe Rae's temper was coming out more, and sooner, than she thought, but she supposed it was only a matter of time.

Before Snooza could open her mouth, Stretch stepped in, almost ordering, "Then, before anything else happens, we need to find that tenement and get there. Now. Where is it?"

"Brooklyn," Rae stated, thinking it over. "By the docks. It's near…Spot."

"Spot?" several of the girls replied in a bit of an excited confusion.

"Yeah, Spot. He's supposed to be a friend of mine. I was supposed to have grown up around him but, now, I'm not so sure what he is. I just know he's not Gabe Damon and that's about it."

"Well, if it helps, he was Irish. Just try to find an Irishman in Brooklyn that answers to the last name of Conlon," Relic muttered with a hint of sarcasm. "Nothing's going to get done with us standing around talking about what we need to do and not fucking doing it, so come on."

Giving Relic a look, arching her eyebrow at the girl's tone, Stretch shook it off and simply told the others, "We need to separate. Rae, find the tenement building and those who don't have anyone to see go with her and get yourselves settled in the flat. Try to get as much food and things you can and hope to whatever higher power you believe in that your character side has kicked in enough to pick pocket and steal without getting caught. Meet us at the Brooklyn Bridge in three hours, halfway between the Brooklyn side and the Manhattan side."

Very nearly splitting down the middle, Snooza, Shoe, and Echo seemed to let out a tense sigh and wave goodbye to the remaining three, Relic looking downright irritated, Gimmick looking forlorn, and Stretch simply looking around.

"If you think I'm looking for anyone Samantha knows personally, you're out of your mind," Relic replied, Stretch rolling her eyes and heading down the streets.

"Oddly enough, my thoughts didn't really revolve around you at the moment," she shot right back, barely paying attention to the other girl, Gimmick deciding it best to keep from even speaking to the two who were apparently quickly losing their minds, in several senses. "We don't need to find everyone that each of us knows personally, but we do need to figure out where our allies are and-"

"Didn't that witch say something about the strike?" Relic asked, for the moment putting aside her anger to try and best figure out what to do about their current situation. Blind rage could wait for a moment or two, until she turned entirely into Samantha if possible. For now, they needed to figure out exactly what would enable them to turn back and, more importantly, to get home. "We need to find out who exactly is involved. I doubt there's a David Moscow with a heart of gold wandering around here anywhere…But there is a Boots."

"And a Racetrack and Kid Blink," Stretch started. "Those we know for sure. Oh, and a One-Lung Pete…You know, I've always been curious about that, maybe now I can actually find out why in the hell they would call him that…But, right, first things first. Place to live, people we know-"

"And like," Relic felt the need to add.

"Right, and like, and money. We need money. Either of your characters pick-pockets or happen to have a ton of money lying ar…Oh! Relic has-"

"Hell no. I'd rather steal," she retorted, Gimmick looking back and forth between the two as if watching some sort of tennis tournament. Apparently the characters of Stretch and Relic were increasingly insane, and she wasn't so sure about being separated into this group while the others moved safely for a more comfortable place to stay. Nothing she could do about it now, just keep her head down and make no sudden movements…

"Then I guess stealing it is. 1899 or not, men still like girls to the point of stupidity, so here's hoping it works well enough to get us a few dollars, right?" Stretch asked, looking at the pair still left standing there.

"Oh! I can do that!" Gimmick replied excitedly, pleased to know the game and the fact that the rules hadn't changed in over a hundred years. Hey, she was a sixteen year old girl. This was the easiest game to play.

Relic, however, looked decidedly more realistic about the whole thing. "The question isn't whether or not you can do it, it's whether or not you can avoid getting caught," she pointed out.

Ah, the problem with any sort of crime, necessary or otherwise (and, at this time, it was as necessary as it gets) is always whether or not the person committing said crime could get away with it. As the three girls moved through the streets in search of suits who could focus more on a woman's figure than the safety of his wallet. However, as the three girls scanned the area to find anyone that may fit the description, they wondered now whether still having their own thoughts and specks of their own personalities were, at this point, an asset.

Not like they had much time to ponder this, however, as Gimmick's hand made its way into the pant pocket of a mustached man who smiled over at the other two, his eyes glancing down at Relic's figure and Stretch's…non-chest. At least, until Gimmick's pinky brushed none too inconspicuously against the man's leg and causing all matters of hell to break loose.

"Hey!" the man yelled out, looking down to see little Gimmick with her little hand in his little pocket.

"Hi!" she said, at a complete loss of anything else to voice in such a situation, the other two rolling their eyes and realizing, damn it all, this wasn't going to end well. Indeed, this was sealed when a shout for the police rang out through the streets, poor Gimmick's eyes widening as her hand pulled back as quick as she could make it.

Too bad the man took the opportunity to grab her wrist, holding her there forcefully by him as he continued to yell out, causing havoc throughout the block surrounding them. If the sixteen year old wasn't panicked before, she sure as hell was now, her fingers desperately clawing at his own, his hand maintaining a strong grip around her thin wrist. At least, until Relic's increasing Samantha side kicked in and, well, in turn she decided to kick the man holding the stunned thief, right in his most valuable of possessions.

Crap. "Run!" Stretch yelled out, indeed booking it as the word left her lips, dashing past the series of offices and street vendors, Relic pushing her way through, following the taller girl, Gimmick managing to shake off her shock long enough to chase after them, her heart beating a mile a minute, pounding into her ears.

"I thought you said you could do it!" Relic couldn't help but call out to the younger girl, Gimmick managing to roll her eyes mid-run. Sure, she had said she could do it, but who knew what side of her had gotten her to say it in the first place, seeing as Lindsey couldn't remember a time she had ever stolen a…well, there was that pack of gum. Damn it all to hell, why didn't she remember that pack of gum and the torment it had caused her five year old self? She cried then and, if she could process everything now, she'd probably be forced to cry again. Too bad she was too busy running to save herself to even think about such things.

Of course, when the three girls turned the corner and ran smack into a group of beat officers, then it would have been a good time to cry. However, Relic was too angry, Stretch trying too hard not to claw someone's eyes out, and Gimmick was too focused on trying to find a way out.

"Well, well, well...What have we here?" one of them said, beaming all too happily at the three of them. "I believe it's the Refuge for these three, what do you think?" Oh joy, something else that apparently was more fact than fiction, though the girls seemed decidedly less pleased about that thought than when thinking about Racetrack and friends. Honestly, who could blame them?


End file.
